The New Partnership for Africa's Development
(NEPAD) is an economic development program of
the African
Union. NEPAD was adopted at the 37th session of the Assembly of
Heads of State and Government in July 2001 in Lusaka, Zambia. NEPAD aims to provide an overarching
vision and policy framework for accelerating economic co-operation
and integration among African countries.

Contents

Origins and
function

NEPAD is a merger of two plans for the economic regeneration of
Africa: the Millennium Partnership for the African Recovery
Programme (MAP), led by Former President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa in conjunction with Former
President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and President Abdelaziz
Bouteflika of Algeria;
and the OMEGA Plan for Africa developed by President Abdoulaye Wade
of Senegal. At an extraordinary summit in Sirte, Libya, March 2001,
the Organisation of African
Unity (OAU) agreed that the MAP and OMEGA Plans should be
merged. The UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) developed a
"Compact for Africa’s Recovery" based on both these plans and on
resolutions on Africa adopted by the United Nations Millennium
Summit in September 2000, and submitted a merged document to the
Conference of African Ministers of Finance and Ministers of
Development and Planning in Algiers, May 2001. [1]

In July 2001, the OAU Assembly of Heads of State and Government
meeting in Lusaka, Zambia, adopted this document under the name of
the New African Initiative (NAI). The leaders of G8 countries endorsed the plan on July 20, 2001; and
other international development partners, including the European Union,
China, and Japan also made public statements indicating their
support for the program. The Heads of State and Government
Implementation Committee (HSGIC) for the project finalized the
policy framework and named it the New Partnership for Africa's
Development on 23 October 2001. NEPAD is now a program of the African Union (AU)
that has replaced the OAU in 2002, though it has its own
secretariat based in South Africa to coordinate and implement its
programmes.

NEPAD’s four primary objectives are: to eradicate poverty,
promote sustainable growth and development, integrate Africa in the
world economy, and accelerate the empowerment of women. It is based
on underlying principles of a commitment to good
governance, democracy, human rights and conflict resolution;
and the recognition that maintenance of these standards is
fundamental to the creation of an environment conducive to
investment and long-term economic growth. NEPAD seeks to attract
increased investment, capital flows and funding, providing an
African-owned framework for development as the foundation for
partnership at regional and international levels.

In July 2002, the Durban AU summit supplemented NEPAD with a
Declaration on Democracy, Political, Economic and Corporate
Governance. According to the Declaration, states participating in
NEPAD ‘believe in just, honest, transparent, accountable and
participatory government and probity in public life’. Accordingly,
they ‘undertake to work with renewed determination to enforce’,
among other things, the rule of law; the equality of all citizens
before the law; individual and collective freedoms; the right to
participate in free, credible and democratic political processes;
and adherence to the separation of powers, including protection for
the independence of the judiciary and the effectiveness of
parliaments.

The Declaration on Democracy, Political, Economic and Corporate
Governance also committed participating states to establish an African Peer Review
Mechanism (APRM) to promote adherence to and fulfilment of its
commitments. The Durban summit adopted a document setting out the
stages of peer review and the principles by which the APRM should
operate; further core documents were adopted at a meeting in Abuja
in March 2003, including a Memorandum of Understanding to be signed
by governments wishing to undertake the peer review.

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Current
status

Ever since it was set up there has been some tension over the
place of NEPAD within the AU programs, given its origins outside
the framework of the AU, and the continuing dominant role of South
Africa -- symbolised by the location of the secretariat in South
Africa.

Successive AU summits and meetings of the HSGIC have proposed
the greater integration of NEPAD into the AU's structures and
processes. In March 2007 there was a 'brainstorming session' on
NEPAD held in Algeria at which the future of NEPAD and its
relationship with the AU was discussed by an ad hoc committee of
heads of state. The committee again recommended the fuller
integration of NEPAD with the AU.[2] In
April 2008, a review summit of five heads of state -- Presidents
Mbeki of South Africa, Wade of Senegal, Bouteflika of Algeria,
Mubarak of Egypt and Yar'Adua of Nigeria -- met in Senegal with a
mandate to consider the progress in implementing NEPAD and report
to the next AU summit to be held in Egypt in July 2008.[3]

Principles

Good Governance as a basic requirement for peace and security,
and sustainable political and socioeconomic development

African ownership and leadership, as well as broad and deep
participation by all sectors of society

Anchoring the development of Africa on its resources and the
resourcefulness of its people

Partnership between and among African peoples

Acceleration of regional and continental integration

Building the competitiveness of African countries and the
continent

Forging a new international partnership that changes the
unequal relationship between Africa and the developed world

Ensuring that all partnerships with NEPAD are linked to the
Millennium Development Goals and other agreed development goals and
targets [4]

Structure

The HSGIC to which the NEPAD secretariat
reports comprises three states for each region of the African
Union, with former President Obasanjo (Nigeria) as elected chair,
and Presidents Bouteflika (Algeria) and Wade (Senegal) as deputy
chairmen. The HSGIC meets several times a year and reports to the
AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government.

There is also a steering committee, comprising
20 AU member states, to oversee projects and program
development.

The NEPAD Secretariat is based in Midrand,
South Africa. The first CEO was Wiseman Nkuhlu of South Africa
(2001-2005), and the second Mozambican Firmino Mucavele
(2005-2008). As of February 2008 a new CEO was being sought.

The NEPAD Secretariat is not responsible for the implementation
of development programs itself, but works with the African Regional Economic
Communities -- the building blocks of the African Union.[5] The
role of the NEPAD Secretariat is one of coordination and resource
mobilisation.

Many individual African states have also established national
NEPAD structures responsible for liaison with the continental
initiatives on economic reform and development programs.

Programs

During the first few years of its existence, the main task of
the NEPAD Secretariat and key supporters was the popularisation of
NEPAD’s key principles, as well as the development of action plans
for each of the sectoral priorities. NEPAD also worked to develop
partnerships with international development finance institutions --
including the World Bank, G8, European Commission, UNECA and others
-- and with the private sector.[6]

After this initial phase, more concrete programs were developed,
including:

The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme
(CAADP), aimed at assisting the launching of a 'green revolution'
in Africa, based on a belief in the key role of agriculture in
development.

The NEPAD Science and Technology programme, including an
emphasis on research in areas such as water science and
energy.

The "e-schools programme", adopted by the HSGIC in 2003 as an
initiative to equip all 600,000 primary and secondary schools in
Africa with IT equipment
and internet access within 10 years, in partnership with several
large IT companies. See NEPAD E-School
program

The launch of a Pan African Infrastructure Development Fund
(PAIDF) by the Public Investment Corporation of South Africa, to
finance high priority cross-border infrastructure projects.

Capacity building for continental institutions, working with
the African Capacity Building Foundation, the Southern Africa
Trust, UNECA, the African Development Bank, and other development
partners. One of NEPAD's priorities has been to strengthen the
capacity of and linkages among the Regional Economic
Communities.

Criticism

NEPAD was initially met with a great deal of scepticism from
much of civil society in Africa as playing into the 'Washington Consensus' model of
economic development. In July 2002, members of some 40 African
social movements, trade unions, youth and women's organizations,
NGOs, religious organizations and others endorsed the African Civil
Society Declaration on NEPAD[7]
rejecting NEPAD; a similar hostile view was taken by African
scholars and activist intellectuals in the 2002 Accra Declaration
on Africa's Development Challenges.[8]

Part of the problem in this rejection was the process by which
NEPAD was adopted was insufficiently participatory -- civil society
was almost totally excluded from the discussions by which it came
to be adopted. The poor quality of the actual NEPAD document is to
some extent a reflection of this lack of consultation.

More recently, NEPAD has also been criticised by some of its
initial backers, including notably Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade,
who accused NEPAD of wasting hundreds of millions of dollars and
achieving nothing.[9] Like
many other intergovernmental bodies, NEPAD suffers from slow
decision-making, and a relatively poorly resourced and often
cumbersome implementing framework. There is a great lack of
information about the day-to-day activities of the NEPAD
secretariat -- the website is notably uninformative -- that does
not help its case.

However, the program has also received some acceptance from
those initially very critical, and in general its status has become
less controversial as it has become more established and its
programs have become more concrete. The aim of promoting greater
regional integration and trade among African states is welcomed by
many, even as the fundamental macroeconomic principles NEPAD
endorses remain contested.

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The Regional Economic Communities recognised by the AU are: The
Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Southern
African Development Community (SADC), the East African Community
(EAC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA),
the Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), the Economic
Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Intergovernmental
Authority for Development (IGAD -- operational in the horn of
Africa), and the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU).